


A Brave Man

by knopeswann



Category: Wonder Woman (2017)
Genre: Diana and Steve get fluffy by the end I promise, F/M, Fix-It, Fluff and Angst, In Which Steve Does Not Die, STEVE TREVOR DESERVED BETTER 2K17, Steve Trevor Lives, but lots of Steve introspection to begin
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-21
Updated: 2017-06-22
Packaged: 2018-11-16 20:10:10
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,152
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11260083
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/knopeswann/pseuds/knopeswann
Summary: In which Steve Trevor remembers a new German technology that just might save his life.Eventual Steve/Diana Fluffiness because that's what those angels both deserved.





	1. The Gamble

**Author's Note:**

> This is seriously my first time EVER writing fic, let alone posting it. I couldn't get these two babies out of my head after seeing Wonder Woman a second time, and as a history major I knew there was MAYBE a way Steve could've gotten out of this (with a few stretches, of course!) This first chapter is all from Steve's POV, but the whole story will not be. 
> 
> I hope you enjoy!
> 
> Here's my mix I listened to while writing as well https://8tracks.com/knopeswann/follow-me-into-the-endless-night

Steve Trevor was a brave man.

Perhaps his bravery had sometimes been brought on for the wrong reasons: pride, in his younger days when a schoolyard dare turned into a black eye and an even worse scolding from his mother. Or maybe recklessness, brought on by a foolishly youthful sense of invincibility that seemed to plague all teenage boys. He had even been told on numerous occasions during this godforsaken war that his bravery could just as easily be mistaken for stupidity, or downright insanity.

But tonight was different. Steve knew what he had to do, and tonight the bravery felt a lot more like fear.

When he realized that the plane containing the gas needed to be grounded away from civilization, a sense of dread flooded through his body and weighed him down where he stood. He thought of Diana. Beautiful, kind and loving Diana, who’s only wish for this world was for everyone to be good. She believed the tales of her youth, tales meant for children that erased and simplified the complexities of humanity in favor of a neat explanation suitable enough for bedtime. Stories of man creating chemical weapons solely to maim each other from far away, melting the flesh off the skin of their fellow man for a cause they had lost sight of long ago did not make for peaceful dreams. 

But this children’s tale was all Diana knew until she saw the horrors herself. And still, she believed that Ares was the key to all the suffering. If she could just defeat him, mankind would be good and loving again, free from corruption. Steve wanted this to be true. He ached for this tale to be reality. Not just for himself, so that he could be free of all this senseless fighting, but for Diana, so that her heart did not have to break again. Perhaps this too was for himself.  He could not get the image of her emerging from that orange fog out of his mind. The devastation aching through her entire body, the betrayal and hurt in her eyes when they landed upon his face.

_“You stopped me from killing Ares!”_

_“I could have saved them!”_

He knew that he could not bear to see that look in her eyes again, but here he was, about to get on that plane full of gas. A plane with no destination or landing. This he knew. There was no coming back from this. He hoped that she could forgive him for what he was about to do. He was going to show her just how much good man was capable of too, but it would cost his life.

 

* * *

 

Steve Trevor was a brave man.

He folded the watch in her hands and turned his back to go before he could look into her desperate eyes again. If he did, he knew he couldn’t go through with his plan. Steve Trevor was a brave man, but he was also a selfish one. He loved Diana. More than he had ever loved anyone before, or would ever again, considering his quickly approaching fate. Every romance he’d had before her seemed like child’s play now.

Leaving her was easily the hardest thing he had ever done. His fate itself did not scare him: for the past few years, he had been operating under the belief that he would not make it out of this war alive. He could feel it in his bones, and this he accepted. But then he met her. And he had never wanted to live so much in his entire life. He wanted, _yearned_ for all of those things he had discussed with her- newspapers, breakfast, children- in a way he had never wanted before. He wanted them with _her_.

He raced down the tarmac, forcing every muscle in his body to keep moving forward even as her desperate pleas followed him.  He knew that she could take his place. He had seen her emerge from the gas unharmed; she was not a human, after all. But even with this knowledge, he could not let her take his place.

_“I can save today. You can save the world.”_

Her mission was bigger than this. She had a god to defeat, and she was the only one who could. It had to be him.

Steve reached the plane just before the wheels left the ground, taking out the German co-pilot as he threw himself into the aircraft. He cocked his pistol, assessing the situation. In his pocket was one of those bombs Chief was always attaching a timer to. He had handed it off to Steve right before he ran off towards the plane. He supposed that Chief was hoping this could help. But time could not be bought. Steve had nowhere to go once he was in the air. He decided that his pistol would work just fine for the task at hand.

To his left, the back of the plane was filled with gas bombs, jammed in like sardines. To his right was the cockpit, where a pilot sat between Steve and his fate. Steve had killed many a man before. War was war, and casualties had become a part of his daily existence. This is what the world had come to. With a well-placed shot into the pilot’s head, Steve could put an end to this gruesome existence- for everyone. One last casualty. Or two, if he counted himself.

But this man was different. This man was the only thing standing between Steve and his own death. Steve knew that it was one thing to believe he would be willing to sacrifice himself for the good of many, but another quite entirely to be so close to that reality. Steve watched the pilot as he continued to fiddle with the controls for his ascent when he noticed how bulky the pilot looked from behind.

Attached to the pilot’s back was a parachute pack. Steve had seen them before, heard intelligence that the Germans had begun issuing them to many of their pilots a few months before. The lifespan of a pilot was so short in this war, being that there was no way out of these flying death traps. Of course, Steve also knew that the success rate of these silk bags attached to cords had been shown to be questionable as well. And jumping out of a flaming airplane to make a gamble for one’s life was just about as terrifying as staying behind to meet one’s fate.

_"I wish we had more time. I love you."_

But he had the time in his pocket, and now he had his way out.

 

* * *

 

Steve Trevor was a brave man.

He had been prepared to face certain death to save the world. He could certainly roll the dice one more time to try out a contraption that could either bring him to the same conclusion or bring him back to earth.  He could especially make this decision when he thought of a raven-haired warrior he loved, who was fighting the God of War at this very moment. He lined up his shot and sent a bullet clean through the back of the pilot’s head. He had never even known it was coming. _Hopefully the last casualty_ , Steve thought.

Steve had to work quickly. The plane couldn’t get very far for the plan to work; it had to be in the middle of nowhere. Moving the pilot’s lifeless body forward in the chair, Steve tried to work the parachute pack off the man’s back. This proved to be more difficult than it looked, trying to angle lifeless limbs to bend to his will. He briefly considered cutting the straps altogether before he realized he would need them. After what seemed like a lifetime, Steve freed the pack from the pilot. He threaded his own arms through the straps, hoping his ability to think on his feet would help him to figure out how to operate his only manner of escape. Running to the back of the plane, he placed the time bomb within the bed of gas canisters and set the fuse. He threw open the door and looked down at the world below him. A scene of complete chaos greeted him. Did he really want to leave this device of death only to meet another one on the ground below?

 

* * *

 

Steve Trevor was a brave man. And the woman he loved was amidst that chaos, fighting a war that was not her own because of him. Without another thought, Steve Trevor closed his eyes and jumped.


	2. The Head and The Heart

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Try as she might, Diana could never make her head rule her heart. In the end, her heart always won. But now the pain was too great, and Diana did not want this heart anymore.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was legitimately typing this chapter on my iPad touchscreen on my break today; that is how badly I needed to get these words out. As the tags say, this story is a fix-it, so pardon the angst (again, sorry- I didn't mean for the almost the entire first chapters to be that way), I promise it will be worth it. It will make way for happiness, smiles, rainbows and butterflies by the end of this chapter.

            Many things could be said about Diana, Princess of Themyscira. She was an Amazon, and a god, after all. Volumes could be written about such a woman and her accomplishments. But for those who knew Diana, it was her emotions that spoke for her character most. Diana’s heart had always ruled over her head.

            No, Diana was not one to cry or make a fuss. She did not stomp off in a huff when she faced defeat. Perhaps emotional would be the wrong word. Passionate could describe Diana, Princess of Themyscira. She felt everything so fiercely that it practically burned her bones. Diana had been told her whole life not to let her emotions influence her judgment and decisions.

            _“There is no room for feeling on the battlefield_ ,” Antiope would say when Diana was young and hesitant to truly attack her teacher.

            _“You cannot rule with your heart,”_ her mother would say during one of her endless lessons on how to be a good and fair queen. _“You must be wise and use your head; the brains Athena has blessed you with.”_

            But try as Diana might, she could not make her head rule her heart. She believed differently. That the head and the heart could work in tandem to guide her to make the best decisions. She had tried to make this work, even when her mentors urged her to do just the opposite. Today was different though. Today, she finally knew that following her heart was the right path to choose. Her head told her so, and surely her head was as good as a guide as her mother and Antiope had always said it could be.

            Her heart had told her many things over the years. But tonight, it spoke loudest. It had broken when she saw the devastation of Veld, and the hate within the hearts of man. The corruption that existed in all of man, not just the Germans. The corruption that was in Steve.

            _Steve._

            Steve was the reason her heart spoke loudest today. Try as she might to be angry with him, she couldn’t fight the stronger feeling, tugging at her heartstrings like a desperate child: she loved him. She had hardly known what love like this would feel like until he had washed upon her shores a few days before.

She had read many tales of love, but they were stories made to entertain. Contained within the pages of a book, they were finite feelings felt only until the pages were closed and normal life resumed. She didn’t know that love could make a person physically ache for the touch of their beloved. That even a smile could send her heart aflutter and spread warmth throughout her entire body. She hadn't know that physical love, especially with a man, could make the body feel as if it were engulfed in flames, delicious and all consuming, a feeling that would not soon be forgotten.

            Love was what made her able to destroy Ares. Her love for Steve, who had taught her what humanity was really like- conflicted and messy and hopelessly flawed, but beautiful and worthy nonetheless. Love was an emotion, yes. An extremely powerful one. One that was powerful enough to destroy a God, but also strong enough to break Diana's heart for what seemed like the millionth time since she left Themyscira.

* * *

 

When her feet touched the ground again, it took every ounce of strength in her body not to sink down to her knees, hoping the ground would swallow her up.

Ares was defeated. She was the god killer; she had saved everyone. But humanity was flawed on its very own, a lesson she had learned the hard way. And Steve was gone.

Diana stood rooted to her spot, looking around but not really seeing, as her mind came to terms with everything that she had seen and learned that day. Diana was so lost in her own thoughts that she did not notice Charlie running towards her, flailing his arms frantically, until he was right upon her.

"Diana! DIANA!"

"Charlie..." she spoke softly, staring at him like she was beginning to see ghosts herself.  Tears began to pool in her eyes. It seemed that she had been shedding more tears in the past twenty-four hours than she had in her entire life.

Charlie grabbed Diana's hand in an attempt to bring her back to the present.

"Come on, Diana. There's no time. We have to go."

Time.

_"I wish we had more time."_

His desperate voice filled her thoughts and the gravity of the situation hit her square in the chest. She felt as if she couldn't breathe.

"He's gone, Charlie. It's done. Ares is dead. And he's..." She couldn't speak Steve's name. The tears began to stream down her cheeks as her emotions crashed down upon her like a tidal wave.

"He will be if we don't get going. Diana, please" Charlie pleaded.

"What are you saying? He's gone. I saw it. I tried to stop him, but..." her voice broke.

"Diana." Charlie kept a firm grip on her arm. "You didn't see?"

"Of course I saw. The plane exploded. He went with it."

"No, Diana. Chief saw it first. Steve bailed out. Stole a parachute bag off the pilot I suppose. Chief and Sammy went to find 'em. We’ve got to go after them. They'll need all the help they can get. If he is alive, he'll be worse for the wear."

Diana barely registered the last few words coming out of Charlie's mouth. Her heart skipped a beat.

_Alive._

She took off at almost a gallop, not even thinking of Charlie being able to keep up.  There was a chance that Steve was alive. The man she loved. The man with the sandy colored hair and piercing blue eyes, blue as the waters of her home. The man who had only entered her life just a few days before but had changed it forever. Yes, Diana might let her emotions carry her away. But right now, they were carrying her to the only thing that seemed to make sense in this complicated world.

 

* * *

 

Quickly, Diana realized she had absolutely no clue of where to search for Steve. She stopped short, breathing heavily as her adrenaline began to wane. Her heavy breath came out in visible puffs against the cold air as she scanned her surroundings. She hadn't seen his miraculous escape, so she could not even begin to guess where he could be. At this very moment, he could be bleeding and broken, lying on the cold ground in agony. But he could be alive. She had to find him.

Luckily, Chief had come to the rescue once again. Above the tree line, she could make out a column of smoke piercing the fresh morning sky. Following the beacon, she broke into a sprint again, determined to reach her destination in record time. She prayed to every god she could think of that she would find Steve alive.

When she broke through the trees at the source of the smoke, she saw them, huddled on the ground over the body of the man she loved.

“Steve…”

She could barely make out the word as she stared at the scene in front of her. Her body ached to move forward, to find the answer to a question that had the power to ease her pain or break her in two. What if that body on the ground no longer held life? What if her hopes had been raised just to be dashed once again? She wasn’t sure if she could take that pain once more.

But Steve was willing to lose his life to be sure that the world, that _she_ , was safe. She could find the courage within herself to look upon his face again and meet her fate. She was Diana, Princess of Themyscira, and her emotions, her _fear_ , would not win out this time. This time, Diana had to let her head make the decisions.

Just then, Samy turned towards her. The look on his face was unreadable.

“Is he…?” She couldn’t bring herself to finish that fateful question.

“He’s breathing, but he hasn’t woken. He clearly has quite a few breaks, especially this leg. We won’t know for sure what the damage really is until we get him out of here. We’re trying to fashion a stretcher now.”

Diana found herself shoving her way between Samy and Chief, crouching on the ground to see Steve’s broken body. He was covered in scratches and soot and dirt, his jacket was torn in several places, but she could see the steady rise and fall of his chest. There was life within this body.

Carefully, she reached towards his face and brushed the hair from his forehead. His body shuddered slightly at touch of her fingers, cold from the morning air. Slowly, and what looked like painfully, his eyes fluttered open. For a few moments, there was no expression on his face but pure confusion. He stared up at the sky before taking in the scene of his friends and Diana hovered over him.

“Did it work?” Steve asked.

“Do you mean destroying the gas, defeating an all-powerful god, or taking a suicide jump out of an airplane?” Samy said this with a hint of sarcasm, but his eyes were wet with tears.

Steve blinked a few times, clearly still having trouble fathoming the situation. Finally, he gave a weak, watery smile.

“All of that, I guess.”

That smile. A sight Diana loved, one she never thought she would see again. With tears of joy beginning to escape from her eyes, she gingerly took Steve’s face in her hands and leaned in close.

“Do not ever, EVER, do that again. Or I will have to bring you back from Hades and kill you myself.”

Steve chuckled. That was the woman he loved, alright.

His smile grew broader when he saw the emotion written on her face.

“Okay, but no promises.”


	3. The Ego

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Some Diana and Steve fluffiness to tie this up. There is some suggestive material, but nothing more than that. Just lots of teasing and banter and my cuties being silly and in love.

“Absolutely not.”

“What? I do not understand what the problem is.”

“Diana, you are not doing this.”

“But it would be so much easier for me. I can do it.”

It had been almost a month since Steve Trevor fell from the sky. Almost a month since Diana, Princess of Themyscira had defeated the god Ares. Almost a month since the Great War, the war to end all wars, had come to an end.

The December night was cold as Diana and Steve found themselves at an impasse. Here was Steve Trevor, still recovering from his many injuries, trying to reason with the fiercest woman he had ever known. He had been through many battles in his life, but somehow this particular one seemed to be the most insurmountable.

“Women do not lift men, Diana. It’s just not done. It’s fine, I can use my crutches to get to the bed.”

Diana raised her hands in exasperation.

“I do not understand. I can easily lift you and take you over to the bed with no trouble at all. Why should you struggle instead?”

Steve found himself running his hand over his face, trying to steel his nerves.

He loved this woman with every fiber of his being. He didn’t mind teaching her many things she needed to know about this world of man. In fact, he could think of a few lessons that he even took great pleasure in teaching, and the thought made a sudden warmth spread through his body. But this lesson was quickly turning into an argument he did not want to have.

“Because!”

“ _Because?”_ Diana’s eyes flared with annoyance as she trained her gaze upon him.

 “That is not an answer. You have been working hard all day, trying to regain your strength. Now it is time to rest. Why will you not let me help?”

Steve looked at her sheepishly, and slowly realization began to dawn upon Diana’s face, and her annoyance was replaced with a sly smile.

“Oh. So is the ego of man so fragile that being carried by a woman is too humiliating? And here I thought you were an above average example of your sex.”

As she spoke, Steve could see the mischief dancing within her chocolate colored eyes.

“Hey! I think you of all people are more than capable of attesting to my above average abilities.”

Steve’s voice dripped with longing and hunger as he spoke. _Damn these injuries_ , he thought.

Diana slinked closing to where Steve sat, lowering her eyes flirtatiously as she did.

“Well, I believe that a truly above average man, a _brave_ man, would be able to put aside a silly little notion such as ego for the sake of his safety.” Now, her face was close to his, her mouth just inches from his lips. “Don’t you agree?”

With this, she moved in so that her mouth just _barely_ touched his, the ghost of a kiss and a promise of what was to come.

Steve could feel his resolve softening as his trousers began to tighten. He threw his head back in frustration as Diana’s mouth moved from his lips to his neck, peppering tiny kisses and leaving a trail of fire along his skin.

“Fine!” he huffed.

Diana pulled away quickly as her demeanor changed from sensual to triumphant.

“Ha! Finally!”

Before Steve could open his mouth in protest, Diana pulled him into her arms and lifted him from the chair.

“Hey! Easy on the goods.”

“Do not worry, Steve Trevor. I have lifted much heavier things than you” she teased.

Gently, she placed him down on the bed and began taking his shoes and socks off.

“Diana, you really don’t have to…” he stopped as she leaned in and placed a finger to his lips.

“Stop. It is already done.” She placed a soft kiss on his lips before making her way around the foot of the bed to the opposite side.

“You’re… staying?” Steve asked as she sat down and began to remove her own shoes.

“I am sure Etta could use a night to herself. I think she had friends coming over for some kind of game. Bridge, I think she said? They like to play very late. It did not interest me.”

 She paused, confused when she saw the concern on his face.

“Is that not alright?”

“Sure… uh, yes!  It’s just that… you know, men and women…. It’s not usually seen as appropriate…” He shifted uncomfortably as he struggled to find the words.

Her face softened.

“Oh. Well, I do not care about all that.  Besides…”

She moved towards Steve, and began to undo the buttons of her blouse.

“I can think of an above average man who could use some rewarding for being so brave as to let a _woman_ carry him to bed.”

Having finished with her buttons, she removed her blouse and slowly drifted her hand across the bed towards his lap.

Steve let out a groan of frustration as her hands began to fiddle with the buttons of his trousers.

“Diana, you know I would love nothing more… but my ribs…”

Her hand stilled for a moment, her face growing serious. She looked at him as though she were truly seeing for the first time.

“I love you, Steve Trevor.”

“I love you too… _God killer_ ” he smirked as he said this, mimicking her accent.

She slinked closer and resumed her earlier ministrations as Steve began to pant in earnest.

“Diana, I can’t…”

“I told you. I have read all twelve volumes of Cleo’s treatises. There are other ways that I can reward such a brave man.”

He pulled her to his face and kissed her with a passion he had never felt before, his hunger for her driving him forward.  She made quick work of the buttons on his shirt and hungrily kissed her way down his chest.

“Man may not be necessary for pleasure, but Cleo did not skip over the methods.”

Steve let his head fall back as Diana’s mouth lit a fire through every inch of his body.

“Thank you, Cleo,” he whispered breathlessly to the heavens.

Steve Trevor was a brave man. And he could think of no better reward than this.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you, thank you to anyone who has taken this journey with me! I can't thank you enough for the reading, kudos, bookmarks and lovely messages. It is so encouraging for a first time fic author. Perhaps I'll do this again sometime. Until then, my friends!
> 
> xoxo, Adriana

**Author's Note:**

> I'm operating under the belief that Steve and his parachute could get far enough away from the explosion before the timer went off. That way, he wouldn't be affected by the gas. A girl can dream, obviously. 
> 
> Please let me know what you think! :)


End file.
